This site may earn affiliate commissions from the links on this page. Terms of use.

Some 20 years after it was first implemented in Netscape Navigator, one of the most reviled and widely abhorred pieces of web surfing history has finally been killed. With the release of Firefox 23, the <blink> HTML tag is no longer supported by any major browser. Firefox 23 also introduces a new, simplified logo, and the option to turn JavaScript off has been removed from the Options window.

Blink, of course, will be remembered as the tag that was once the brazen champion of everything that GeoCities stood for, much like the Statue of Liberty and the USA. As the web matured, though, and GeoCities went out of vogue, so did the blink tag (and its similarly distasteful cousin, <marquee>). Unless you intentionally go out and look for it, you probably haven’t seen blinking text in years — and if you have, it was probably provided by an animated GIF, CSS, or JavaScript, rather than the actual HTML tag. Blink has already been removed from WebKit (and thus Chrome and Safari), and it was never supported by Internet Explorer. Ironically enough, Google’s new Blink rendering engine doesn’t support blink, which means that the new version of Opera (which uses Blink instead of Presto) also lacks support. With Firefox 23 retiring support for blink, major browser support is finally at an end, and thus we enter a new epoch.

Rather famously, the blink tag was conceived by some Netscape developers in a bar. Lou Montulli, who is usually credited with the original idea, says “the blink tag [is] the worst thing I’ve ever done for the internet.” The developers were discussing the implementation of some new HTML tags, and how Lynx, by virtue of it being a console-based text-only web browser, wouldn’t be able to render many complex elements or text styles… except for blink. “We had a pretty good laugh at the thought of blinking text, and talked about blinking this and that and how absurd the whole thing would be,” Montulli said, recalling the origins of the blink tag on his blog. The next morning, Montulli came into work, and it turned out that one of the developers from the bar had stayed up all night to implement the blink tag in Netscape. (Read: The Browser Cold War.)

Much laughter ensued, and the developers decided to keep the tag in Netscape Navigator 1.0 as an Easter egg. The feature was undocumented, but at some point someone discovered the tag — and within a matter of months, most of the known web resembled Las Vegas. “I remember thinking that this would be a pretty harmless Easter egg, that no one would really use it,” Montulli said. Oh how wrong he was. (See: The death of Firefox.)

In other news, Firefox 23 introduces a new logo — the third time it has changed in the last 10 years. The new logo is very similar to its predecessor, except it has been simplified to improve its rendering on smaller (read: mobile) displays. Basically, many of the highlights and fur details have been removed. You’ll also be glad to hear that the red panda’s arm has finally been fixed; no longer is the poor animal painfully contorting itself to embrace earth. There are also new logos for the Aurora and Nightly (beta and alpha) versions of Firefox.

Finally, Firefox 23 removes the option to disable JavaScript from the Options pane — and if you had JavaScript turned off, it has been turned back on. This contentious change derives from the fact that disabling JavaScript breaks many websites — and some people might turn off JavaScript without actually knowing what it does, resulting in unpredictable and frustrating behavior that the user might blame on Firefox. JavaScript can still be disabled via about:config or with add-ons (such as NoScript).

You might try reading the article. Not just the headline. You CAN turn off JavaScript, just that it has to be done in a round about way.

Thomas Wolf Tompkins

Ya cannot turn off javascript was the sole reason i used firefox. Going to certain sites I loved turning it off so no pop ups or ads

WatDah

Have you tried using Adblock?

Jeremy Garcia

Relax people. Firefox just removed the disabling JavaScript option from the Options menu to make the browser a little more newbie friendly, since not having JavaScript breaks a LOT of websites. You can still disable JavaScript via “about:config” (if you are hellbent on not having javascript anywhere), or by the preferred method of plug ins, such as NoScript.

Garageneinfahrt

It’s annoying to see Firefox being dumbed down in order to be compatible with people who do things they don’t understand in the configurations. If I don’t know what X is, maybe I better not change the original configuration of X!! Simple as that. An alternative way to deal with this could have been to introduce explanatory texts into the configuration, as fields or as those yellow info boxes. Or some auto configuration or reset feature.

Jeremy Garcia

I do agree, but the fact of the matter is most people do not have what should be considered common sense when it comes to computers, and they really need to be protected from themselves. Also, Firefox already has what you are suggesting.

Firefox does have a help a button in the options window that links to a support page that explains all the options in detail on the options tab from which you clicked the help button from. Example, I was on the Privacy tab, and clicked Help, and I got linked to the Privacy settings help page here: http://mzl.la/Nqvgma

Firefox also has a reset button, or you can reset the preferences by deleting the preferences files. Admittedly, I actually had to search this (via DuckDuckGo), but the Mozilla Help article was the first result.http://mzl.la/MLVHSq

It reminds me of Ubuntu. The advanced settings are out of the way of newbies so they won’t break their system, but still accessible to the power users. Mildly annoying? Yes, but I don’t think it actually hinders power users from tweaking their operating system, or web browser in this case.

Thomas Albrighton

But there are always people who will think that JavaScript is nothing but malicious software

Allan Richardson

When a web site that you MUST use, such as for communicating with your DOCTOR’S office, INSISTS that Javascript must be enabled, or its features will not work, you have no choice. In this case the web site’s “help” has an FAQ for “submit button frozen” and the remedy is to turn on Javascript. The “help” page for Firefox tells how to turn it on (for a specific web site), but the icon to do so is not displayed, and I have not found out HOW to display the icon. However, about:config says JS is ENABLED, but NextMD apparently is getting a different indication.

Allan Richardson

After leaving a message with the doctor (not yet called back) and going to the main NextMD site and sending them an angry email with the screen shot of the problem, I was able to use NextMD to send a regular message to my doctor, and then retried the order for medication and it WORKED! I still want them to know that Javascript is not a good tool for a critical-application web site.
Just a one-time glitch, apparently (or not?). I still don’t know how to enable JS only on selected sites.

Jamie MacDonald

Gotta be honest, the Firefox logo has gotten worse since the ’05-’09 version.

Michael Carr

The 2009-13 logo is my personal favorite. Very crisp-looking.

Joel Detrow

I like the newest one. They all look good, though.

Jamie MacDonald

Oh, they’re still pretty, but it reached the pretty pinnacle in ’05 I personally think. I can understand the simplification, though.

Garageneinfahrt

True. Even though there were things to be fixed with the 09-13 version (placement of the arm), they were tiny and not to be “corrected” like this. The new logo is so flat and pale it becomes much worse at small sizes because those small contrasts melt together. A logo can be as great as it wants, it’s only a matter of time until it’s going to be abandoned because somebody has an urgent, non-negotiable need to convey some frickin’ “new identity”.

Frank

Do NOT Drink and Code People!!! The blink story should teach why that is ultra important!!!

Techutante

How would any coding ever get done then? All the best ideas come from people who were wasted!

Frank

It’s a double edged sword, isn’t? All the worst ideas comes from people who are wasted :) Maybe we should start having designated coders to keep the worst ideas from making it to compilers!

fuqdisqus

Put the “disable Javascript” in the Options menu, fascists.

I decide what to block and when, and I want to be able to do it simply.
Fascists!

RightWired

Firefox is now IE.

Techutante

The first website I ever built, in high school, on a Pentium 2 200-Mhz machine, is still hosted by the school system. It contains every bad thing about the web, even pre-geocities. Flashy, blinky, scrolly, colored divider bars, awful children’s jokes. One day I’ll run for some important office, and someone will that website up and I will have to go kill myself.

ᅠᅠᅠ

Entirely blocking JavaScript isn’t difficult, although I don’t condone decisions based on the principle of hiding stuff for everyone because some people might be confused. It seems to be a very popular trend at the moment. Like when every developer started to think they needed to hide all their application menus under one button because, you know, every additional level of indirection and inconvenience is a good thing apparently. What they’re really doing is building mazes into their user interfaces, in the hopes that less tech-savvy people get lost in them before they stumble upon any actual options. That’s not my idea of ideal human-computer interaction.

What I’m more concerned about is the additional settings dialogue that was available for JavaScript. There, you could prohibit certain sites from doing annoying things, like changing your browser window size or blocking the context menu. These options seem to have not just been hidden in about:config, but the functionality removed entirely.

I guess I’ll just have to wait for someone to write an extension to restore it. It’s getting kind of ridiculous that for every new “major” release of Firefox I have to browse the Mozilla add-on site for extensions that undo the more stupid changes. The times of new versions adding and improving on features seem to be well behind us, the focus now more on deciding which ones they can remove again.

Hear, hear. But the first problem with plugins is the Minecraft syndrome: with every new version, dozens of plugins either become directly invalid or exceed their range of developer-configured allowable versions, and there’s a continuous game of catch-up being played as a result. The other problem with plugins is the whole burdensome nature of plugging in content instead of it being natively supported. While “lean and mean” is evidently what developers want these days (and I hate, hate, hate that mentality: why not let *me* decide what I want out of your product?), there is no question that built-in functionality is always faster and more robust than externalised functionality.

Shulk

hooray! now without java disabled..I have to listen stupid pop up songs in someones blog!! ITS SO AWESOME!! and that anoying facebook force like popup with right click disable in blogs/webs!! its so freaking awesome! I have to go around the about:config just to enable it back again on another website!! its soooo smoothhhhhhhhhhhh! this is a revolution firefox!! woohou!

hooray! now without java disabled..I have to listen stupid pop up songs in someones blog!! ITS SO AWESOME!! and that anoying facebook force like popup with right click disable in blogs/webs!! its so freaking awesome! I have to go around the about:config just to enable it back again on another website!! its soooo smoothhhhhhhhhhhh! this is a revolution firefox!! woohou!

frozentea

Hello. I am a beginner webmaster. I was using the Blink tag. but now which tag can I use instead of that? I need to show a blinking text in my first page, specially on firefox. Could you help me with this?

Allan Richardson

Can’t turn ON javascript even for a trusted website; the website does not work, and ITS help page says to turn Javascript on; firefox wiki says to use the icon at the left of the address bar, but there ISN’T any. Checking about:config confirms that javascript IS enabled, but the NextMD website I use to communicate with my doctor will not submit requests, claiming that Javascript is disabled. And neither Firefox nor NextMD has any human contact available to find the problem!

Andy Cash

Who made the ridiculous choice to remove the option to turn javascript off? I can’t test a website properley with js on, so like the rest it’s goodbye from me!

Nick Green

I occasionally have to visit sites with javascripts I don’t trust. It’s never been a problem because I could easily turn javascript on and off. Now…

Not interested in addons to replace what should be a native function. I don’t use addons as a rule and am not going to start now.

Looks like it’s time to switch to Chrome.

Arch

Sad. As a mainstream browser, a change int his way was predictable. It’s us, competent users, the ones affected. I have justifiable privacy concerns about Chromium and, of course, Google Chrome. Opera doesn’t even let me disable Internet search from address bar. Firefox is my only reliable choice, but “simplifying” it for dumbs makes me mad. I still keep using a mainstream browser just for Lastpass. Anytime I may move definitely to Konqueror, Arora, Midori, or other.

pcl

I hate JavaScript. Not that it is never necessary or useful, but the way most browsers handle user-end scripts and applications is an absolute disgrace. There is no way to tell what’s running at a given time except those annoying “a nun-responsive script may be slowing your browser down” messages that appear too late and, in later versions of Firfefox, appear to slow the browser down even more than the scripts themselves. Also, the scripts from previous web sessions hang around even after the tab has been closed; the only way to get rid of this hangover effect has been to disable JavaScript. I tried NoScript a while back, but it seemed to slow the browser down even more, and lets face it, add-ons are just plain junky. I’ll try about:config; if it doesn’t make it easy to turn JavaScript off and on quickly, it’s time to look for a new browser. Any decent browser should have a toolbar-accessible button to control any scripting and an easily reachable console to see what is running and kill any scripts that are known annoyances or risks. Pathetic … just pathetic.

mikehaseler

I’m just searching for a way to stop a piece of javascript which is stopping me using a website. Being able to turn off javascript is a bit like a fire-extinguisher. It’s not something you want to use or normally would, but only a right idiot would remove that option.

bug menot

They broke a lot of stuff since the infamous 4.0 inflated version number madness. We need a huge list of addons to get those features back or go to something like IceWeasel to avoid these issues entirely.

1) Searches
Can’t add your own search engines in a user-friendly way, XML files put in searchengines folder no longer are automatically registered, Javascript method to load custom XML files on your own PC would seemingly work but even with Shift-F4 scratchpad they won’t. Oh and separate search engine for address and search bars for convenience? LOL, nope!

2) Javascript being disabled explicitly and then reenabled in an update? WTH? NoScript FTW!

4) Version numbers that don’t indicate a major code freeze. Mainly because they now seem to be trying to clone Chrome.

5) Not mentioned in this article but also removed: ‘Load images automatically’ and ‘always show the tab bar’ options. SettingSanity supposedly restores these 3 options.

6) I got tired of listing them, bah…

Googling “The removal of features from Firefox” leads to a whole list of addons to restore some of these features. Addons like Clone Window, Hide Bar with One Tab, …

BroLebowski

While Firefox is slower then chrome with start up, its still a power house, there will always be about:config options. I wish however it didnt change the gui so much that it broke some cool things that 3.6 had … i mean my browser was anorexic-ally thin in desktop real estate, something i cant imitate with later releases .. p.s. who cares about “blink tag” it can be done other ways.

This site may earn affiliate commissions from the links on this page. Terms of use.

ExtremeTech Newsletter

Subscribe Today to get the latest ExtremeTech news delivered right to your inbox.

Email

This newsletter may contain advertising, deals, or affiliate links. Subscribing to a newsletter indicates your consent to our
Terms of Use and
Privacy Policy. You may unsubscribe from the newsletter at any time.